


guilt-tinted

by softgrungeprophet



Series: Compass [5]
Category: Venom (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Apologies, Gen, Introspection, Mental Link, dog symbiote, implied/referenced arguing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-19
Updated: 2018-12-19
Packaged: 2019-09-22 19:55:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17066075
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softgrungeprophet/pseuds/softgrungeprophet
Summary: He would apologize as many times as he needed to.





	guilt-tinted

**Author's Note:**

> In the main story there is [an intermission in which Eddie and Flash get into a bit of a shouting match, and Flash subsequently shuts himself alone in his room to calm down.](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16892598/chapters/40333721)
> 
> This is what happens after that.
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> 50/50 chance eddie's shirtless

"Flash..." Eddie leaned his forehead against the doorframe. He wrapped the symbiote's leash around his hand in one or two loops, barely aware of doing it at all. "Are you... okay?"

It had been about an hour.

It wasn't that he felt concern, exactly. It wasn't that he felt guilt, exactly. But... weak as their connection was, he could feel his other reaching a tiny, half-formed spike of disappointment into his thoughts. A welcome change from silence, and a welcome change from the chaotic panic of ten years' worth of multiple people's bad memories all slammed into him at once. So he stood outside of Flash's bedroom door, eyes closed and forehead pressed to wood, with the symbiote sitting expectantly at his feet in its dog form, waiting for some kind of answer.

Okay, maybe he _did_ feel guilty.

"I'm sorry."

He _was_. And he'd say so as many times as he needed to.

"I shouldn't have—" He breathed out. "I'm sorry."

Not that he didn't still feel in-the-right—not right for raising his voice, but right in his expectations. That Flash should have been there. Should have known.

But... Flash _had_ been there for them. These past two weeks, Flash and Andi, housing and feeding Eddie and his... family. Inadvertently restoring half a semblance of connection between Eddie and his other, even if that had been a completely unforeseen side-effect of briefly relived trauma. Weird to feel grateful for being forced to experience what felt like a thousand emotions at once, so thick they blocked out the sun.

The doorknob turned, and Eddie moved back a little bit, out of the way—though the symbiote immediately tried to hop up onto Flash's lap, pawing at his thighs, tail wagging, stretching up to lick him wherever it could get to—jaw, nose, mouth, ear. Flash gave it a wan smile and cupped its face in his hands, stilling its excited ministrations. "Hey, buddy." He gave it a pat and then gently urged it down. "I gotta pee, okay? I'll be right back."

Eddie moved the symbiote over to the couch—he sat against one arm and let it nestle right beside him, in the crack between the cushions. Its tail still wagged and he could feel the gentlest pulse of love through their connection. Not directed entirely at any one thing... It was like, now that he could feel it and it could feel him, it just oozed with relieved affection toward anything and everything it saw. Love for him, love for the air across its flank, love for Flash, love for the girls—though they were out on their walk, still. Love for Sleeper, and Mania.

Under it all, there still ran that slight undercurrent of fear, anxiety, unhappiness, paranoia. But for now... love overwhelmed them both.

It was... strange to view Flash through this lens, when he finally came out of the bathroom.

Simply because he was _Flash Thompson_.

He settled on the far end of the couch from Eddie, a few strands of hair stuck damply to his forehead from, presumably, splashing water on his face. He still wouldn't look at Eddie, eyes red and face slightly flushed. But he smiled at the symbiote in its dog form, as it rested its head in his lap and looked up at him with big silver eyes. He ran his hands along its head, scratched its ears and under its collar, and back up under its chin. All the while, muttering soft little things—"Hey," and "Good boy." He didn't seem to mind the drool, though his smile faltered when he noticed Eddie watching.

Eddie looked away.

He hadn't even realized he'd been staring.

He closed his eyes and kept quiet, and focused on the barest strains of feeling flowing between himself and his other.

**Author's Note:**

> Sometimes, trying to force a conversation with someone won't help things... but you have an alien goo friend in common that can turn into a dog and maybe offer some comfort, at least.
> 
>  
> 
> i apologize if there is some kind of heinous spelling or grammar error i missed, it's 4 am


End file.
